It is no secret I mostly read the classics to save me from disappointment and better utilization of time. It’s been years since I’ve last picked a book written after 2010 but when The Midnight Library was suggested to me, I was curious.

A fantasy book about libraries? – Cool! Count me in! That’s what I thought when I first encountered the synopsis of The midnight library. Apparently, this book also won the Goodreads yearly award of the best fantasy book of 2018 and was quite popular. But I was not to be convinced by that as I don’t care for it but the synopsis caught me off guard. When you are about to die, you end up in a library and you are given the option to explore alternate lives you never lived and could possibly have lived and you can amend your regrets along the way. What will you do in such a case?

The protagonist of the book, Nora Seed is apparently a failed human being, driven to the door of suicide by pent-up guilt, losing her job, and being all alone with no family and relationship. When her attempted suicide takes her to a mysterious place, a magical library of a sort, with a stern-looking librarian in it who for the sake of convenience resembles her high school librarian. She tells her there are an infinite number of books in that library and each of them is a version of life Nora could have lived. And she still can, if she chooses to. She can envision any life where she could turn back any decision she regrets. Lives where she became a rockstar, went through her marriage with her boyfriend, or continued her swimming career to be an Olympic gold winner athlete. Or even the ones she didn’t or couldn't imagine and are in no way connected to her life whatsoever. Initially, Nora reluctantly explores a few versions of her life, being quite fed up with life, but soon she rekindles some love for the act of living and starts exploring lives. Will she find the perfect life for her?

The book had a great start story-wise. I also liked the protagonist Nora. She is a philosophy major and her favorite philosopher is Henry David Thoreau. Well, so is mine. Her cat is named after Voltaire, another of my favorite philosophers. Throughout the book there are lots of agreeable quotes from both of them and it was pleasant for me too.
The problem is that it starts to resemble a self-help book under the disguise of a fantasy one. I personally despise self-help books and have no interest in them. As Nora explores her lives, she is faced with a cheesy cheap realization only a self-help writer could think of and this was such a turn-off for me. Still, the book was pleasant enough that I continued to read it. I guess I also felt the need for a closure of the story, the lives she finds and whether she finds the happy life she seeks. But in the end, it was a disappointing read. Fun, but not memorable.

I will never read this again, and can’t recommend it to anyone either. But if you don't mind self-help and need some confirmation bias, be my guest.